A novel about people with extraordinary, supernatural powers in a country without faith.

Literary fiction

Markéta Pilátová has chosen to set her novel, Diviner, in the misty landscape of the Jeseníky Mountains in North Bohemia, infamous as the site of gruesome medieval witch trials. However, she combines this setting with parallel worlds bordering on the fairy tale. In spite of that, the story takes place in the present and focuses on two very different men with “supernatural” powers, abilities verging on sorcery. Both the diviners and the powerful manipulators of the communist regime use their abilities in their own ways, inadvertently drawing attention to the atheist Czechs who desperately wish for something to believe in: something mysterious, miraculous or spiritual.

Markéta Pilátová (1973) is a novelist, Hispanics scholar and journalist. She graduated in Romance Studies and history from Palacký University in Olomouc. After graduating she worked there as a lecturer for six years. From 2007 to 2008 she was the foreign affairs editor of the weekly magazine Respekt. She subsequently travelled to Argentina and Brazil: for five years she taught the children of Czechs who had emigrated from Czechoslovakia to Brazil and Argentina. She has published essays, articles on international politics, reports, reviews, short stories and columns for several different Czech publications (e.g. Respekt, Lidové noviny, Právo). In addition to novels she has also written award-winning books for children and young adults. Her books have been translated into German, Dutch, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. She lives in Prague and Velké Losiny.